Russia used to export a lot of refined products, so they loose the profits of doing the refining.
They liquidated a bunch of their industrial refining capacity in the late 90s/early 00s thanks to Yeltsin’s implementation of Shock Doctrine economic reforms.
My home town of Houston hosts a bunch of Soviet made refinery equipment bought for pennies on the dollar from overseas.
That’s got nothing to do with current EU sanctions. If anything, Russian reinvestment in heavy industry has been one of the brighter spots of the Putin Regime and a major source of his popularity.
Last year 17.5% of EUs LNG imports came from Russia. There is no reason for doing that more then three years after the full scale invasion.
There’s a strong economic reason to obtain gas from the lowest cost provider. LNGs floated in from the US can’t meet demand and cost 10x Russia rates at market.
Combine that with the US tariffing of trade deficits and insourcing of energy consumption for AI development and you’ve left Europe with no other option for gas power.
They liquidated a bunch of their industrial refining capacity in the late 90s/early 00s thanks to Yeltsin’s implementation of Shock Doctrine economic reforms.
My home town of Houston hosts a bunch of Soviet made refinery equipment bought for pennies on the dollar from overseas.
That’s got nothing to do with current EU sanctions. If anything, Russian reinvestment in heavy industry has been one of the brighter spots of the Putin Regime and a major source of his popularity.
There’s a strong economic reason to obtain gas from the lowest cost provider. LNGs floated in from the US can’t meet demand and cost 10x Russia rates at market.
Combine that with the US tariffing of trade deficits and insourcing of energy consumption for AI development and you’ve left Europe with no other option for gas power.